Deck Construction Lynn MA

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DECK BUILDING - A personal story

All Decked Out

By Mike McIntyre

I'm building a deck in my front yard. Let me rephrase that: I'm assembling a collection of lumber pieces and hardware in our front yard with the hopes that I can make it look enough like a deck, or at least some recognizable structure so that the neighbors won't laugh. At least not out loud.

It started out in a seemingly harmless way as a "free estimate". You fellow homeowners know the scenario to follow. You can probably already hear the familiar "Jaws" music beginning now. We had a roof that looked in need of some work. Specifically, it looked as if every wind that ever encountered our house was at an upward angle and contained some amount of airborne greenish slime. The edge shingles were curled up like moldy taco chips. So when this guy called on us to give a free estimate on re-roofing the place we thought, "hey, what could it hurt to get an estimate?".

Well, three days later it hurt to the tune of $15,000. It included not only the replacement of the house roofing but several other items. Re-roofing and re-siding the garage, a new garage door with an opener, all new windows, glass-block windows for the basement, and finally, at the insistence of my wife (whom I may never trust again), the breaking up of my perfectly functional (though ugly) concrete front porch and sidewalk. This was to allow (force) me to build the front deck that I had been talking about for years. And since we weren't quite ready at the time to replace the existing structures, we lived for several months with an assortment of rubble McNuggets in our front yard. The person that I'm sure this bugged the most was the postman. He not only had to traipse through all of the broken concrete rubble, but also had to probably lob our mail NBA-hook-shot style up to our mailbox, which is mounted next to the front door. This is because with the missing porch the mailbox was now about nine feet off of the ground. He's a nice guy, but this had to try his patience, and I can only hope that he doesn't own any automatic weapons.

I thought that I could build this deck since I have prior experience. I built my first deck at our house in a Detroit suburb. It ended up as a structure on which you could park a cement truck. It was up against our pre-fab (factory-built) house that was located in an upscale mobile home park. If a tornado ever hits it (c'mon, what are the odds that a tornado would hit a mobile home park?), the house may go, but the deck will still be there.

So when I bought my first real house, of course I had to build a deck. This one ended up in the back yard, is 22x24, and includes two finished sets of steps, several flower boxes, a built-in railing bar (for food and drinks), and custom-cut trim/molding everywhere. It is the overkill deck from hell, and you could probably park TWO cement trucks on it (as long as you don't mess up the trim).

How to build a deck

Introduction

Few home improvements can match a wood deck for usefulness, beauty and enhanced value to a home. For adults, decks offer outdoor living space for entertaining, sun bathing and dining. For children, they provide an excellent outdoor play area.

But the best news about a deck is that it is an ideal home improvement construction project for the average handyman or woman. Design is straightforward. No advanced carpentry skills or sophisticated tools are needed. If you can hammer a nail, saw on a straight line, and read a level, then building a deck should present no major problems.

What's more, the use of pressure-treated lumber helps assure that your project will be virtually maintenance-free and will provide enjoyment for decades to come. You won't even have to paint or stain the wood, unless you want to. Left unfinished, it weathers to a rustic gray. It is a good idea to seal the deck periodically to prevent the wood from checking, however.

There's enough information in this article to help you design and build an attractive wood deck. However, if you don't find exactly what you want here, be sure to post a question in our forums , and ask our site experts or email us here at Handyman Wire.

Tools

Building a deck is easier and usually better done when proper tools are used. Certain property and construction conditions may necessitate special tools, but the following list will suffice for most deck projects:...